With Parliament usually dissolved within two months of the release of the boundaries report in past elections, observers expect the custom to hold.

Sept 12 remains the hot date for the polls – Seventh Month celebrations notwithstanding. This is the last Saturday of the week-long school holidays, and schools are typically used as polling stations.

School examinations rule out October and early November as windows for an election, and late November will be packed with global summits involving Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and other ministers.

Another popular date, Sept 5, is no longer viable as Parliament should have been dissolved last Wednesday for that to be the case.

… Political science professor Bilveer Singh from the National University of Singapore believes it makes no sense for the PAP to hold off when a September election is “a very good window to go to the polls and win big”.

“Any delay will eventually hurt the ruling part as the opposition would be more prepared, and public goodwill will start to dissolve,” he says.